UK Scientist Inches Closer To Living Metal

[lolmynamewastaken]

terminators chaise was made out of coltan, and was just about the only thing that wasn't a synthetic organic.. thing... sorry, just saying.
on the brightside, atleast he's not the start of skynet.

 

[direkiller]

I hat to be that guy but... How can this possibly benefit us? Is it really a good idea?

Because its interesting?

Really that is all the justification you need to do something.

Nnyahh... I'm not so sure.

I love science (even though I'm not particularly good at it), and there are few things I despise more than unnecessary scaremongering about science, especially when people use the 'Frankenstein' comparison (because for one thing, Frankenstein never actually happened).

But you know what did happen when a bunch of scientists were just given complete free reign to dick around with a technology they didn't fully understand for no more reason than "because they could"?

Chernobyl happened.

Like I said, I love science. But I also acknowledge that science with no restraints and no real point could be just as bad as no science at all.

Chernobyl happened because the people in charge of it were incompetent.

Exactly. All I was saying was that if we start completely ignoring the dangers of exploring the unknown, and doing it just because it's cool, then we are also being incompetent.

The higher ups were fully aware of what might happen at Chernobyl the benefit outweighed the risk for them(until the risk came and bit them in the ass)

Chernobyl was there to produce weapons grade plutonium the power it produced was considered a useful byproduct. Things normally in place to prevent such things were removed in order to produce WGP easier.

Chernobyl wasn't science gone wrong it was government gone wrong and valuing a bomb over the safety of a few thousand people

 

[RJ Dalton]

Just don't unleash the gray goo.

 

[Spartanmk1]

Anyone else a little worried about this?

This is one step closer to grey goo.

 

[Missing SHODAN]

Hrm, the actual results seem to be a far cry from life. It sounds like his big accomplishment is replacing the head group on a phospholipid to make it a phospho-metallic-lipid, which while neat is not really the same as making 'living metal'. You'll get mycelle formation, sure, but I fail to see how that's much different from the mycelle formation you'd get with detergent in water. Certainly, Tide doesn't suggest they're inching closer to 'living soap', nor do we get people on the forums wailing about how science is about to throw us to our suds-y doom.

It sounds like the hydrophobic interactions are coming from the organic part of his molecules, so I fail to see how this is even a demonstration that you don't need carbon for life. It's closer to a demonstration that you might be able to get away with slightly less carbon. I suppose, "Scientist demonstrates that one or two carbons could be replaced by metal atoms in some biological molecules" is not as exciting as a headline.

That said, although I think the current claims being made are a little premature, I'll be on the lookout to see if he gets anywhere interesting with this.

 

[ShindoL Shill]

inching closer?
weird fetish...

That said, although I think the current claims being made are a little premature, I'll be on the lookout to see if he gets anywhere interesting with this.

he's just getting there, so i dont think he's that premature.
had to say it.

OT: well thats good for science.

 

[The Funslinger]

I hat to be that guy but... How can this possibly benefit us? Is it really a good idea?

Well if it somehow functioned to full Terminator 2 level, I'd fucking want a hand made of that stuff!

 

[gery900]

O.O

DO WANT

 

[Bloodstain]

Wait, so...Phyrexia awakens? ALL HAIL THE FATHER OF MACHINES!
Kudos to my fellow planeswalkers who get the reference.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Sound a bit like he's making a puppet talk. Hey guys when I do this its just like how a cell works... honestly I swear!

Interesting. Not sure what to make of it though. I'd like to see silicon based life but I don't know if we can just make it or duplicate it.

 

[Cousin_IT]

lower case i needs to be banned as a prefix

 

[Zykon TheLich]

If they create necrons, it will an awesome end of the world :3

DAMMIT NINJAD! Still posting this.

SNIP

Totally called it.

Living metal sounds cool as hell though. Want some. Make some of these. They rock. Science in the media is pretty warped though. Im sure this isnt even accurately portrayed in the slightest.

CAPTCHA: the acdenti, thats what it will be when we actually make necrons >.>

Well maybe not proper necrons, doubt we could make a gauss flayer and live, but itd be as close as we could get.
And science might be misshown in the news, but we're actually a lot closer to massive breakthroughs than people think, its just that no one will put in the money as it isnt profitable.
But if get nuked by a monolith, i will die happy! ^^

The guys name is Lee Cronin that's pretty close to Necron anyway...

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

Living metal? Sorry, but Kerry King is already alive.

 

[Critterbot]

One step closer to making Terminators/Terminator terminators and ultimately, Skynet. Awesome.

 

[Anchupom]

This is the second Scottish attempt to create living metal; the first resulted in this:

Spoiler: *Spoiler*

I LOVE YOU


I personally think this is really fucking cool and means that we can have metal skin, bones, muscles and everything. If only a popular form of media explored this concept...

Spoiler: Spoilered because of a giant mofo image

Well. Kind of.

 

[BehattedWanderer]

I'll take my education in metallurgical engineering for a bit of a run, here, for a bit, instead of decrying that the machines will rule us all. Let's list some positives, here, shall we? Bone grafts made of metal cultures that act like bone. Valves, stems, channels, and prostheses that can have more advanced and adaptive cultures growing on them, to better suit the individual body requirements. With what he was positing about being able to divide hydrogen and oxygen ion, if it comes to fruition, it means we can grow an energy source that provides consistent energy, as the photosynthetic reaction persists.

I should quite like to see the structures under a high powered microscope, and see what kind of microstructure the metals and oxides are exhibiting. Selective penetration could be quite useful in the refractory alloys I'm studying.

EDIT: Reading his other paper, from Jan of last year, he shows an amount of self replication, or at least self-assembly, of a nanowheel. That is actually quite impressive, and given what he is intending to do, the idea of combining them becomes something much more potent.

 

[The Lugz]

I hat to be that guy but... How can this possibly benefit us? Is it really a good idea?

Well, if we can prove that forms of life can exist outside of our own organic, carbon-based experiences then we just open up a titanic scope for existences of life throughout the universe, not just on Earth-like planets in our particular temperature band around their stars with similar atmospheres. For some reason (as in, despite all the fun sci-fi) scientists have been operating under the assumption that life has to be similar in basis to ours. If we (read: clever guys in labs) can prove otherwise then our galaxy officially becomes much more theoretically populated!

Also, it's freaking cool that there are people doing this sort of thing - creating building blocks for life from metal whilst others are being able to write their own DNA sequences and inject them into organic cells to make them do what they want. It's either the beginning of Mankind's evolution, or our destruction, and either way it's pretty freaking awesome

between this technology, the blood micro-spiders, nano-robotics and test tube organs
you'll have a CHOICE of products to replace your decaying body parts in the future, who'd have thought of that, eh.
quite fantastic.
i'd go the full a.i core though, to be honest i'm kinda sick of having a physical presence to wash, clothe feed ect on a daily basis. i'd rather just sit and think.

 

[spartan231490]

If it doesn't have something that approximates dna, and by that I mean a means of passing on some kind of information on how to build oneself into the next generation, then it isn't alive. It's not even close, and it certainly can't evolve.